Brewery

The Ultimate Canadian Craft Beer Experience takes you on a taste-filled trip from the 1860s to present day as you explore the flavours and history of stouts, porters, ales, and lagers. The Ultimate Canadian Craft Beer Experience is proud to be a Canadian Signature Experience.

Quench your thirst for history!

Here we have recreated a working brewery as it would have been in the mid-1800s. Our brewer, in period costume, handcrafts ales like those enjoyed in Ontario’s country villages around Confederation, alongside new interpretations of old favourites.

Black Creek Historic Brewer recreates the techniques, tools and recipes used by brewers in 1860s Ontario. Our brewmaster creates small-scale batches entirely by hand. It’s a great place to learn about beer because, unlike a modern commercial brewery, you can see every step in the process for yourself. And no one else has a brewmaster ready to welcome visitors in period costume!

In the 1860s there were 155 registered breweries in Ontario and countless smaller operations besides. Black Creek Historic Brewery is the first in this province to replicate the brewing processes of that era, when there was no electricity, no stainless steel tanks, and no mechanized bottling plants.

The equipment at Black Creek Historic Brewery is made mainly of wood and copper. The beer ferments in wooden casks just as it did in the olden days. Malted barley is shoveled by hand into the mash tun. Hot water converts the starch in the malt into a fermentable sugar, which then infuses into the liquid-now called “sweet wort.” The barley husks act as a filtration bed, allowing the wort to pass from the mash tun. We then boil the wort and add hops, both for flavouring and as a natural preservative. Once the boiling is complete, the wort is cooled and put in barrels where the yeast is added. After five days of fermenting and a week of aging, the beer is ready!

Visitors can sample the beer at cellar temperature, the way it was enjoyed in the past. You’ll be tasting the authentic flavours of ales made by hand, just as they did in the 1800s.

Come visit the Black Creek Historic Brewery! We can promise great conversation, an old-time feel — and, of course, great beer.

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The Ultimate Canadian Craft Beer Experience takes you on a taste-filled trip from the 1860s to present day as you explore the flavours and history of stouts, porters, ales, and lagers. The Ultimate Canadian Craft Beer Experience is proud to be a Canadian Signature Experience.